Basic Configurations
by bluelily3
Summary: This is when Kururu and Aki are still in the hotel after Keroro and Mois's wedding, figuring stuff out. It's about the inevitable "what are we to each other?" talk, and it from Kururu's POV. We all know he wouldn't handle this or any other TALK well. So here's his reaction.


The blinds were closed, even though it was another beautiful day on Keron. Deep in the recesses of his mind, the thought registered faintly, but it was dismissed. Weather was irrelevant right now. There were too many other things to think about. Too many things that he would rather not think about. And for once in a long time, one of those thoughts was Aki Hinata. It had always been easy to think of her before...last night.

Now he sat on his bed in a Keronian hotel room, typing away at something obscure. He had to stop for a moment to remember what he was doing. Math equations and blueprints sprawled across the screen. Was he building something? He brought his hand up to his mouth and bit the skin on the tip of his index finger, a nervous habit. If he were a Pekoponian, he would have taken up nail biting. This was the first time in a long time that he had actually forgotten what he was doing. Of course, Kururu was known to get sidetracked, but not this bad. Sidetracking meant errors, and errors meant getting court martialed. He didn't know if he had it in him right now to weasel his way out of one of those situations again.

Just when he had blinked his eyes a couple times and got his bearings on what he was doing (correcting a few errors) he heard a snick at the door. Someone was slipping in a card key. The only person that had the card key was her. Aki. He hadn't even given Saburo one. He was going to wait until the kid asked, but now he wasn't so sure if he should. Saburo could keep a secret and all, but this was something that should be handled delicately. As in...no one should know for awhile. He took a deep breath as he heard Aki step into the room. Right away he knew that she was still in her Keroninan form. Her footsteps made the trademark squeaky sound. They were slow and uncertain. This surprised him. After last night, there should be nothing hesitant about her. The two of them had done things he had never even known existed. Not just physically, but mentally and...God help him...emotionally.

He continued to type, even if it didn't make sense anymore. All of his attention was trained behind him. Her smell, (damn it all, she smelled like him) the sound of her breathing. The air caught in her throat. Could she still want him so badly or...was she upset? This was hard to tell without looking. He was about to slowly turn around when...

"Kururu?" Her voice sounded a bit unsteady. His stomach did a flip and he mentally chastised it. Calm down, you idiot.

"Eh?" His voice gave absolutely nothing away.

"I want to talk to you." She sounded serious. Only one night, and she was already doing the woman thing that he couldn't stand. Here it came... The inevitable talk.

"Just tell me what I did wrong, and I'll...deny it. Ku, ku..." He said. His eyes were still on the screen, but his hands had subconsciously stopped typing. Like it or not, he needed to hear this. Aki was more important to him than any of the others had been.

"It's nothing you did wrong. I just...have some questions." She sat down on the bed. Now came the point where he chose whether or not to keep the laptop open or shut it and give her his full attention. He didn't like to use the glowing screen as a crutch, but he avoided so many social situations that way, and the dim light was so comforting. He chose to leave it open. At least for a little while.

"Ask away, then." He pretended to study the ridiculously botched templates before him. It was a good thing Aki wasn't a brilliant creator.

"Kuru-chan..." She sat even closer and put her hand on his. Now they both stradled the laptop mouse like some weird techo three-way. "About last night..." She was quiet again, and it was agonizing. Kururu held his breath and thought of a hundred different things she could say to him, none of them good. 'It was all just a a joke', 'I was faking it', 'You're so small I could barely feel it', 'Was it good for you?','Your stamina isn't so great', 'What's with those noises you made?', 'This was a mistake', 'I demand a refund'. Okay, so he had heard that last one, but not in a sexual situation. He couldn't take the silence any longer. He turned his face from his screen and looked at her dark face.

"Yes?" He drew the word out, making it sound lazy and carefree. She didn't know that he was biting his lip while he said it.

"I just wanted to know more about the bonding thing you mentioned. I mean, the resonance and everything. What does it really mean?" Kururu let his breath out slowly. It wasn't about the sex, it was about the Bond. For a moment he was relieved, but then he realized this could be worse. Keronians actually felt less strongly about sex than they did about a Match between two people and the process of Bonding. What he and Aki did last night was technically something that should be done when a couple was married. Again, not the mating part, but the Resonance. They had did both at the same time, which was pretty taboo. Kururu had known what he was doing. He had wanted Aki for a long time now, and he had made his choice. He just thought that for some reason, she would know what she had done, being such a willing participant and all.

"Uh...didn't I explain it to you?" This was a weak question. He knew very well that he didn't. He might as well have gotten her to sign a contract while she was high on something. And she practically had been. On him.

"Well, not really, Kuru-chan. I resonated with you, and you said something about a Bond, but you didn't really explain-"

"Nothing much to explain. We're just...together. That's pretty much..." He trailed off. This was pathetic. He shouldn't be hiding anything from her. He had been down that road before, with both genders. Omitting things, shrugging things off. He didn't want to do that with Aki. Aki was a woman he respected and loved. He couldn't let himself do this again. For once he could be serious about something. But he also didn't feel like explaining the whole thing. It was something that couldn't really be said in words. He thought that she had understood.

"Aki...I thought... Didn't you feel the same thing I did? It seemed like we were pretty in sync last night. I shouldn't have to explain. Matched and Bonded is just a Keronian's way of saying we have good chemistry. That we'll stick together...or something..." He wasn't going to add 'the rest of our lives' because it was cheesy and kind of scary if he thought about it a little. Suddenly Aki looked scared too.

"Did we get married? Oh, no. Why didn't you-?"

"What? Calm down...it's not like marriage."

"Do Keronians even get married?"

"Well, yeah, if they want to. But this isn't-"

"Are we ready for this? I mean, oh, God, what's going to happen when we get home?"

She stood up and started pacing. Kururu just sat there. This was the exact reason why he didn't get into relationships. Dammit. Why did they have to have so much chemistry? The woman was never going to let him have a moment's peace again. Just the idea of that...Aki, following him down to the lab, Aki, cooking his food (and doing it wrong), Aki, encroaching in on his curry baths...it made him want to just kill himself now and be done with it. He could feel his eyes glazing over already. After a indeterminable amount of time went by, she finally stopped pacing and looked at him. He was still just sitting there, staring at the wall. He had tuned her out, thinking of his own desperate future.

"Kururu? Are you even listening to me?" She sat down next to him and took a deep breath. "Okay. I heard myself just now, and I sound like a mother. I mean, I am a mother, but not yours. I guess I am freaking out. We didn't get married, it's not set in stone...we're okay. Right? Kuru-chan?"

He shook his head to clear it.

"What?" He continued to stare. Aki looked alarmed.

"Are you-?"

"Okay? I...wow. I'm not really sure."

"Are you scared?"

"Huh?"

"Of me? Of...this."

"Are you going to be permenately attached to me like a barnicle from now on?" He hadn't meant to say that out loud, but...there it was.

"What are you talking about? No! Do you think I just turned into some needy, clingy woman over-night? You should know me better than that."

"Right. I should...Of course you aren't. Ku... This is all too much drama for now. Can we just-"

"You want me to go? I can, if you want. Maybe you need more-"

"Just sit down for a second, Aki. Let's figure this out."

"I thought you said it was-"

"Forget what I said. I'm just not used to this emotional crap."

"Kururu. That's the whole reason I came in here."

"Eh?"

"I wanted to know if you would be okay with this. You're not very...relationship-y."

"I thought you came in here to ask about Bonding."

"I did. But it was because I was wondering about you. I've never known you to be the way you were last night, and I guess I thought..."

"It was some sort of fluke?"

"Yeah... I guess."

"I thought you were gonna say that too. Ku, ku. No woman has ever been serious about me before. Hell, I've never been serious about them, either."

"So..."

"So. You came to check up on me."

"No. Well, maybe. I don't know. I guess I just wanted to see if we are on the same page. Last night was like...something from another dimension. Maybe I just wanted to check if it was real."

"Ku, ku, ku... It was. No tricks, Aki. I meant what I said, and...did. As long as..." He sighed.

"As long as what?"

"As long as you respect that I like to be alone. The idea of you just-"

"Oh, Kuru-chan, of course! I know how you are! If you tell me you wanna be alone I'll leave."

"Yeah, but the thing is...I shouldn't have to say it. I have a very busy lifestyle, and-"

"Don't I know it. We both do. That's why we mesh so well. We both know and respect this about each other."

"Ku..." He sighed again. Aki leaned up against him, testing the waters, and he let her.

"Okay." She said. "So the bottom line is...we are together now, but we aren't letting it get in the way of other things."

"Exactly. Ku...! That's...what I wanted to say." She smiled up at him, and the rush came back again. She was so hard to resist. Then he remembered that he didn't have to anymore. She would let him do whatever he wanted. He leaned forward and felt her soft lips on his. They lingered for awhile. He had never liked closeness, to be touched before. For some reason, she was an exception. Scientifically, it didn't make any sense. So, instead of analyzing it, he went with it. Like he had last night.

20 minutes later, he lay panting on top of her, forgetting all of the drama. After all, he was basically still only a man, with basic needs. Then he noticed that his laptop was still on the other side of the bed, still open. Mocking him with the screwed-up configuations. If this was what Aki did to his work from now on...he was in way over his head. She whispered his name then, a tone he had only dreamed about before. Well, if he got canned from the army, there were a thousand other options for him. And now, Aki Hinata was one of them.


End file.
